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Can you successfully offload the Orion website from a Main Poller onto an Additional Web Server?

Hello All,

During our recent Thwack Camp 2018 Tips & Tricks session with Dez and KMSigma there was a brief mention of being able to offload the Solarwinds website off the main poller onto an additional web server. I tried to get some more detail on this during the live session chat but there was so much going on that Dez and the team just did not have enough time. Im really interested in doing this if it can be done successfully without any issues. Can you just blow away the website and adjust the entries in the database? Will the configuration wizard rebuild the site during the next product upgrade? Any information will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

mcordero

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Accepted answers

wluther

mcordero I believe they were referring to setting up an Additional Web Server, which is the IIS version of an Additional Polling Engine. In other words, just as you can purchase a license for an additional polling server, you can do the same for an additional web server.

Depending on the needs of your environment, you would buy a couple of licenses for additional web servers, setting them up to be load balanced. Then, you simply point all user web traffic to the new VIP, which load balances between your new web servers. Being that you should now have 0 web traffic on the primary server, you could possibly disable the web settings on that server, and recoup any resources previously used.

Additional web servers are relatively inexpensive, and have only a single purpose. (to maintain your web console)

I hope this helps, but let us know if you need more info.

Thank you,

-Will

All comments

wluther

Additional web servers are relatively inexpensive, and have only a single purpose. (to maintain your web console)

I hope this helps, but let us know if you need more info.

Thank you,

-Will

mcordero

wluther I understand and appreciate the information provided. I have a few Additional Web server licenses and have one already setup in my Orion environment. What I was wondering was, once I have pointed all users to the new AWS is it possible to disable, delete or uninstall the website portion on the main Orion poller? If so, is this a supported model? Is there any dependency within Orion associated with the website or IIS on the main poller? I just want to make sure that if I blow away the website on my main poller I dont break anything.

Thanks,

mcordero

dgsmith80

I believe it is possible to delete it, however, the configuration wizard would rebuild it each time it is run. I would probably suggest simply disabling it so that in the event of an AWS Failure you can jump on and enable it to allow access onto the system.

wluther

I agree with dgsmith80. Since everything will be rebuilt during the next upgrade, and it's always good to have an easily accessible backup, I would just stop/disable the main site once everyone is pointed over to the new site.

bmallon

Why would you want to do this anyway? Say your web server dies in a fire, you still have access to everything SolarWinds by accessing the web interface from your main poller. You don't have to publish how to get there, so your traffic will be zero on the main poller, but in a pinch it is REALLY nice to be able to still get to SolarWinds. Besides, it's nice to have that secret access to SolarWinds in your back pocket to use when everything seems most dire.

If it's another running instance of IIS you are concerned about, there are many ways to protect it / hide it.

bourlis

I would highly discourage disabling the web service on the primary. We have 3 AWS and did exactly what Will suggested. However, we kept web service on the primary for the following reasons.

Solarwinds admin access: The only people who log into the primary system are Solarwinds Admins, thus keeping the load to a minimum.
Solarwinds web troubleshooting: From time to time we've had issues with either the load balancer or one of the AWS's. It was helpful to fire up the web console on the primary and then compare the responses between each of the AWS's. We're able to quickly identity issues on a certain AWS.
Additional load balancing in a pinch: When we need to take a AWS down for one reason or another we simply add the primary to the VIP to help shoulder the load. We're going to be rebuilding our AWS systems here shortly. We'll simply add the primary to the VIP and then take down one of the AWS's for rebuilding. We'll add the newly rebuilt system back into the fold and take down the next. Wash, rinse and repeat!
Emergency console access: Similar to the issue above we had a .NET issue that took down our AWS's. All we had to do was add the primary to the VIP and everyone had access to Solarwinds. We were able to limp along with everyone on the primary until we were able to isolate the problem and fix it.

Those are a couple of examples of why you shouldn't offload or disable the web service on the primary. I'm sure someone can argue or come up with different solutions, but these worked for us and it's quick and easy. At the end of the day if no one is using the web service on the primary, secure it change the URL to something else, document it and leave it as is. You never know when you might need it in a pinch and having it there ready at a moments notice is invaluable, versus having to turn it on in a pinch when that "oh snap" moment hits.

wluther

These are all very good points.